DSAEK - Endothelial Transplant

Descemet's Stripping Automated Endothelial Keratoplasty (DSAEK)

A very common cause of a cloudy cornea is a damaged inside, or endothelial, layer of the cornea.  The endothelial layer is one cell layer thick and can be damaged by surgery or trauma or the cells can die too quickly over time (a condition known as Fuchs' Dystrophy).  When there are not enough endothelial cells, water can build in the cornea causing cloudy vision and vision loss.  DSAEK is a highly refined technique that replaces just the endothelial layer of the cornea, allowing surgeons to target the specific cause of the patient’s vision loss.  In the DSAEK procedure the damaged cells are stripped from the patient’s eye and replaced with a very thin back portion of a donor cornea.  This procedure allows your surgeon to literally replace only the damaged area of cornea, allowing a more precise treatment and better overall results.  Your surgeon uses an air bubble technique to hold the new tissue in place in the eye for the entire day of surgery so that no sutures are needed.